Set Me Straight

A week ago I visited the orthodontist, smiled super wide and came home with train tracks on my teeth: less obvious ceramic ones on top but a traditional set of silver (for reasons that are not interesting) on the bottom.

To be honest (and the Don will probably laugh at this since he has lived with me for the last week) I've not minded having them on at all.  In terms of being self concious about the braces anyway, and except for the ache that they give me in my teeth.  I did, however, also have a couple of globs of cement put behind my two top front teeth to correct my overbite (basically to stop my back teeth resting together which then allows my front teeth to cover over my bottom teeth which, with braces on, would constantly hit against the brackets).  And I totally understand why I have the cement and how it's going to help me in the long run, but I came away speaking like Sylvester the Cat, which in my opinion gave the Don a disproportionate amount of laughs that first night.  And it made me really self concious talking to people.  Worse though, was the fact that I couldn't actually close my back teeth - they were never closer than 5?mm maybe.  The orthodontist assurred me that my teeth would grow to fill the gap, but in the meantime...?  This last week I have eaten quiche (but not the crust or the bacon), soggy Rice Krispies, an awful lot of yoghurt, baked beans, a surprising selection of soups, and really anything that can be squashed a little bit and then swirled around in my mouth until the saliva dissolves it enough to swallow.

Anyway, I went back today to get the back brackets in and the proper wire on, and after expressing my concerns of slowly starving, or thlowly thtarving, over the next 18 months the orthodontist agreed to shave some of the cement.  Now my s's are mostly pronounceable again and the gap between my molars is definitely less so I'm a whole lot happier.  And we'll see how the chicken goes down tomorrow night.

But if you're at all interested, as I am, in how and why things work, this is a pretty good explanation.  Of course you might have found this all out when you were 12 or 13 and going through this yourself, but for me it's all fascinating!